“For fuck’s sake, Will, read the damn room,” Mac snapped.
Will glanced around, confusion on her face. “What do you mean? This room?”
Rory waved her hand through the air as if swatting away Mac’s concerns. “It’s nothing. Y’all go and have fun. I’m pretty beat, so I’m gonna head home.”
“It’snotnothing, Rory, and stop pretendin’ it is. This isusyou’re talkin’ to. If you can’t be real with us, who can you be real with?”
Her breath caught in her throat as her mind conjured up the answer without hesitation. Nash. She could be real with Nash—shehadbeen real with Nash. The thought brought a sudden rush of tears to her eyes, her throat burning as she tried desperately to hold them back. She couldn’t cry here. Shewouldn’t.
Mac took one look at her and gave a brisk nod. “Let’s go. We can sneak out the back.”
“What’s happenin’?” Will asked. “Y’all headed to Nash’s?”
“I know you’re drunk, so I’m gonna give you a little leeway here, but open your damn eyes, girl! If you spent more than five minutes detached from Finn’s mouth, you’d see that our sister needs us.Rory.” Mac waved a hand in her direction. “The one who never needs anything needs us now.”
Will turned wide, questioning eyes on her, but Rory couldn’t speak. Couldn’t open her mouth to tell Will she was fine. That Mac was blowing this all out of proportion. That everything was going to be okay. Because it wasn’t. Everything absolutely wasn’t going to be okay, and if she said even one word, she’d break.
She’d break because in her heart she knew what needed to be done.
She was already in too deep with Nash, and it was going to hurt no matter what. But if she cut ties now, she might be able to walk away with the majority of her heart still intact. There was no doubt it’d be painful, and she’d have herself a few good cries over letting him go. She might not have been torn up over her marriage ending, but she knew, without a doubt, if she went down that path with Nash, she wouldn’t be quite so lucky.
Better to end it now rather than down the line when she’d be ripped to shreds over their demise.
Will must’ve read something in Rory’s gaze, because she nodded once. “Okay, let’s go.”
And that was it. They marched her straight out the back door of The Willow Tree without a backward glance. Who knew it’d take Rory crumpling completely for her to feel that connection with her sisters she’d craved for so long?
Her entire life, she’d been the strong one. The one who solved problems and got shit done and did it all with a smile on her face. But now…? Today? She didn’t want to be the strong one. She wanted someone else to hold her up, just for a little while.
Because of that, she didn’t shrug off Will’s arm around her waist or Mac’s around her shoulders as they ushered her toward Mac’s car. She didn’t push Will away when she sat in the back seat with her, holding her hand and studying her the entire ride back to Mac’s place. She didn’t even try to stem the tears that leaked from her eyes in a near-constant stream.
Her heart was breaking over what needed to be done, but her sisters were here. Maybe the fall wouldn’t be so bad.
It’d been nearly a week since Nash had been in the same room with Rory. More, actually, if he didn’t count that night at The Willow Tree with Nat. And he absolutely didn’t.
All day and night, he’d watched Rory from afar, keeping an eye on her, because something had happened. He could tell in the way she held herself, in her forced smile. And his gut told him it was more than just Nat being home.
He’d wanted nothing more than to comfort her, take her in his arms, whisper something in her ear to make her get mad at him just to see a little of that fire back in her eyes. Of course, he hadn’t done that. Rory had made her stance on that perfectly clear, and he was going to respect it. For now. So instead, he’d taken the ribbing Nat had given him without much comment.
Yeah, he was gone over Rory, and there was no use denying it. He wasn’t going to bother lying to himself about it anymore. What was the use? He’d crushed on her for ten long years when she’d only been an unattainable fantasy. But the reality of her? She was even better than his imagination. Was it any wonder he’d fallen for her?
And he was pretty damn sure she felt the same about him. Except, in the time since he’d been at her place the night before Gran’s party and now, something had spooked her. She was running scared, making up excuse after excuse for reasons she couldn’t see him. Every single one was complete and total bullshit.
She was ghosting him again, just like she had in the beginning. Courteous enough to respond to his texts, but not enough to tell him what was going on. Just enough to keep him away.
Well, he was done with her brush-offs. He wanted to know what the fuck happened to make her go from riding him on the couch, her eyes so full of emotion as she looked at him it’d nearly choked him, to her not even wanting to be in the same room with him.
He came to a stop in front of her house. He’d worried she’d be holed up inside and wouldn’t answer his knock, but she sat on the porch swing he’d made her. Their eyes locked as soon as he stepped out of his truck.
“Thought you were goin’ out with your sisters?” he called. That’d been the lie she’d fed him today when he’d asked if she wanted to Netflix and chill.
Except he’d seen Mac at The Willow Tree and had come right out and asked her about it. She’d admitted she was working all night, and Will and Finn had some wedding shit to deal with. It was an easy enough lie to catch Rory in. Too easy, in fact. Almost as if shewantedhim to figure it out. As if she wanted him to confront her on it.
Well, she was getting her wish.
She sat with one leg tucked under her, the other hanging down, pushing her back and forth in a slow rhythm. “They had to cancel.”
He climbed the steps and didn’t stop until he stood directly in front of her. “We both know that’s bullshit, Rory.”
